Guild Wars 2

Hmm i have a powerful computer so i know it not my comp.
but this is what i’v noticed so far.

We sent 6 golems to enemys keep door now why i was stood next to them i could see all 6.
but take around 10 steps backwards they disappear.

This has never happened before.
so tec unless things are around 5 foot in front of me,i cannot see them.

We go to fight 4-10 guys, it turns into 30. Why would we directly engage 30 with 5 guys….we wouldn’t. Anet, this system is terrible. Worst loading I’ve seen in any open system. T E R R I B L E

Culling is much better. I hope ANet is careful about the feedback they get in here. I think some of those saying it isn’t better were in fact those abusing it and are hoping to get it reverted back.

As someone with a really good computer, culling is next to non-existent for me in most situations and when I do have some it is when there are over 100+ players all in the same small area. The culling change is great and I hope ANet doesn’t revert it again. If you are having more problems now then before it is cause your computer is trash, the new system requires more resources on the player’s end which is fine cause my computer was not getting stressed by GW2 to begin with. It is about time ANet stopping programming for the lowest common denominator.

There actually isn’t any way this system is going to get less enemies displayed on your screen. They appear first.

So yeah, I’ve come to the conclusion that those saying otherwise are mistaken or lying.

Culling is worse than before…, and a new friend is coming : lag …..

I love how they fixed it!
Before they would all appear on top of me, and thieves would be stealthed forever.
Now thieves are so much easier, I guess it wasn’t a L2P issue after all
Anyways, thanks ANET for the fix!!!

Revert it back.

It’s awful, worse than ever.

Now, enemy warbands instantly pop on my head.

When you tried the alternative culling system in november, you had A MEGATON OF NEGATIVE FEEDBACK on it.

So why the hell did you put it back in ?

All my guildies (and alliance guilds) are willing to stop the game because we can’t have correct WvW fights anymore.

Add to this your bugged queue system (actually, on Jade Sea vs Piken Square vs Riverside), we are like 50vs50vs50 maximum instead of 166vs166vs166 with a megaton of friends in queue for 2 hours), there is nothing left to play in normal conditions.

Please, REVERT IT BACK again.

Yea, this is alot worse than before, imo.

Well, what did you expect when they decided to roll out a system a second time that failed previously.

It might be better for slower computers, but that’s not the point. You guys might be happy when you see anything at all maybe.
On faster computers you see 5 ennemies. at 15m.. wait for it.. 5 ennemies at 10m..wait for it… AND BAMMmm 38 ennemies at 5m. I got a super computer and I play with all my settings on pure performance.

Ridiculous realy.

Sureshot.6725:

Culling is much better. I hope ANet is careful about the feedback they get in here. I think some of those saying it isn’t better were in fact those abusing it and are hoping to get it reverted back.

Your so wrong.
I have a i7 very good computer tbh.
I don’t abuse culling because i hate it myself.
Also i don’t want it reverted back,I want it fixed.

when your 10 feet away and they all disappear,when it did not happen before you know something is wrong.

XxTAFxX.6741:

Sureshot.6725:

Culling is much better. I hope ANet is careful about the feedback they get in here. I think some of those saying it isn’t better were in fact those abusing it and are hoping to get it reverted back.

Your so wrong.
I have a i7 very good computer tbh.
I don’t abuse culling because i hate it myself.
Also i don’t want it reverted back,I want it fixed.

when your 10 feet away and they all disappear,when it did not happen before you know something is wrong.

Sign.

Its better, and a step in the right direction anet. I’m running a core2 3ghz and before I could never see thiefs. Now I see thief’s in wvw much easier. There is no more perma hide except in large battles when im off roaming I can see thiefs almost when I should now when they come out of hide.. TY

I have high end machine and its an improvement for me and my guildies.
I can see the enemy coming and appearing out of portals way faster. I know where my guild is I don’t need to see them all as long as we all push at the same time we can still bust a Zerg.
I can see that pug groups need to see each other so maybe prioritizing your commanders could help? But for organised. Groups it’s all about seeing the enemies so for me the new culling gets two thumbs up.

Hi!

I am curious, is your GW2.exe or dat file on a SSD drive.

For those who are having issues, you are guys on normal HDDs or SSDs?

FW

Kinglette.4906:

I have high end machine and its an improvement for me and my guildies.
I can see the enemy coming and appearing out of portals way faster. I know where my guild is I don’t need to see them all as long as we all push at the same time we can still bust a Zerg.
I can see that pug groups need to see each other so maybe prioritizing your commanders could help? But for organised. Groups it’s all about seeing the enemies so for me the new culling gets two thumbs up.

Fannwong.3059:

Hi!

For those who are having issues, you are guys on normal HDDs or SSDs?

SSD Intel 520.
i7-3770k, 16gb. GTX560ti-448.

Yep I have GW2 on an SSD too and I highly doubt that has anything to do with it :P

But apparently for some people it’s fixed…

SSD I7 16g gtx 670.

Hello Centrix,

What are you system specs besides the SSD? For the rest of the folks who have culling fixed, please let us know your system spec. It’s too early to say, but it seems there’s a pattern here.

1. CPU
2. Ram
3. Storage type

Thanks,
FW

Centrix.4065:

Yep I have GW2 on an SSD too and I highly doubt that has anything to do with it :P

But apparently for some people it’s fixed…

Culling is terrible. Implement the low-res mechanic on the OLD system instead of this horrible system which you already tested and failed with once.

You are alienating core WvW guilds with this.

The culling this time around is far worse for me.

My X58A-UD3R motherboard sports the following;

Intel Core i7 “960” 3.2
Radeon 6850 1GB Graphics Card
6GB Super Talent Ram
Kingston HyperX 120GB SSD

16 gb
64 bit home premium
i7 3930k cpu 3.20gz
256mb ssd
directx 11
geforce gtx 680

Culling is significantly worse.

I love the culling fix. I haven’t crashed in a zerg vs zerg since the fix, while previously I was crashing every time we ran into more than 15 people.

crouze.3078:

Culling = server calculating what you will see and then send you the data.
pro: you can play with a worse internet connection / GPU.
con: calculating needs time and you have to wait longer for the data.

No. Culling = client – server comms are capped to a specific amount (5KB/sec), which means if there is a sudden spike in the amount of data required to be sent (such as 30 players from each side clashing at high speed or portalling in), then then server only sends as much entity information as will fit in that 5KB/sec, which in practise means delays in receiving player model/position updates.

The core issue is that GW2 was designed badly – it has too much custom character stuff – all those facial and body properties you customised on character startup, plus all those armour and weapon skins all have to sent from server→client, and all have to compete with position/damage updates for bandwidth.

Default models allow the game to prioritise position/dmg updates more, but the core issue is still poor network implementation and/or poorly thought-out game design.

Seems the fix really only helped certain people with older computers or bad connections and, if anything, made it worse for some people. I personally have noticed no improvement to enemy zergs, my groups still get into a lot of trouble because entire groups are invisible or it looks like a lot smaller group until we’re right in the middle of them. On top of this, I now have friendlies disappearing and reappearing constantly, sometimes without names above their heads to make me wonder “is that a friendly or enemy?” until I mouse over them. It’s a fix, for some people, but it is by far a pathetic fix.

The lack of a kitten that Anet gives to PvP, both sPvP and WvW, is really sad. It doesn’t take this long to fix culling if they really cared. I imagine they have one guy working on this..

Really not sure how to classify this culling change.

When I ran an afternoon duo. Thieves appeared better and couldn’t hide as long as they used to.

Then we started gathering some more guildies for our usual 5-10 man roaming and it got a LOT worse. Friendly targets popping on and off screen seemingly at random. Enemy duo’s changed into 10-15 when you hit them.

Hell even guards at Garrison where on my screen. Then suddenly gone. Then back again 3s later.

I don’t run zergfests, maybe those are better as well?

In short, my style of play, small man vs bigger groups got a huge hit. It’s next to impossible to get enemy numbers right now.

For the solo’s against thieves it got better.

Zergs, you guys tell me!

I ran in Zerg and Small Man both had terrible results.

-Zerg, whole groups of the enemy were appearing and disapearing.
- People in our teams were disapearing,
- It looked as if we were outnumbered some of the time, I had to say look at the dots we have more people but then the enemy disapeared so we were not sure anymore
- We were chasing individuals and as they ran into the zerg they were culled

Small Group, ran to the middle island only to suddenly be surrounded by 30 people, we did not see them before just walked in one by one and suddenly they all appeared at once

I will attempt to fraps some of this as its not only happening to me but the general population.

Even if there were nametags and no models that would be better than what we have now.

SSD + GTX680

This needs removing and fast , i even like the pervious culling better than this …. i had to wait a sec or two and they would render ….
Now i dont know if i’m leading my small grp into a sea of 50 enemys or 4 … and they just keep dissapearing and re-apearing , its anoying and unplayable its gotten to the point whre wvwvw is not fun anymore.
And i’m taking a break from wvw , its not fun to play as it is.

GW2 is built on a horribly bad engine not made for WvW… i doubt it will ever get fully fixed…

Engine cant show players on screen, max is what 70? ESO= 300 cap
Engine cant make bigger maps, they are very very small. ESO = all 4 together wont be even close to as big…

I think we need to accept what we got because their choice of engine wont let WvW get much better.. and them not talking with us so that we can know this and think of new ideas that could work within these limitations is in doing so impossible…

I love the culling fix as well, thieves are much easier to fight (actually a level playing field now instead of 3 sec of free invis every time they stealth).
I much prefer this over anything we have played with so far.

After having tested this out as I mentioned before I am noticing a big improvement on the culling issue of enemy.

The problem that this fix has now is that friendlies are disappearing and it is actually alot of friendlies that are disappearing, not just one or two and when running with a commander ive actually had the commander disappear.

It may not seem like a big deal but when your told to stick to the commander and you cannot see him it makes life hard and at times im rushing a zerg in the hope that the fellow friendlies I cant see have actually rushed with me and not stopped. Otherwise its a case of checking the minimap constantly to make sure I see lots of green dots following. It is making it harder to run with a group of friendlies and altho its nice to actually see the enemy im not sure wither this is better or worse. It is just a flip side of the coin of the same issue and leads to the same result in the end which is players getting frustrated at not seeing things rendered on the screen. Add onto that if your with a group of golems, have fun seeing those things as they vanish in and out of vision. Its hard to stick to those golems and protect them when its like they have the new stealth ability added.

As I said wither its better than before im still unsure but ive not had the issue where I see 6 enemy and its actually 20-30.

I normally run in small groups and the culling/rendering is worse for me now than it has ever been. I have even had loot bags not load correctly.

mjharrison.3209:

crouze.3078:

Culling = server calculating what you will see and then send you the data.
pro: you can play with a worse internet connection / GPU.
con: calculating needs time and you have to wait longer for the data.

No. Culling = client – server comms are capped to a specific amount (5KB/sec), which means if there is a sudden spike in the amount of data required to be sent (such as 30 players from each side clashing at high speed or portalling in), then then server only sends as much entity information as will fit in that 5KB/sec, which in practise means delays in receiving player model/position updates.

I don’t know where you’re getting this number from, but in large fight I’m getting network utilization of 0.15-0.20+% on a 100Mbps link. That’s 0.15Mbps or 150Kb/sec. This is a far larger number than the 40Kb/sec you are claiming is the maximum.

Visiroth.5914:

mjharrison.3209:

crouze.3078:

Culling = server calculating what you will see and then send you the data.
pro: you can play with a worse internet connection / GPU.
con: calculating needs time and you have to wait longer for the data.

No. Culling = client – server comms are capped to a specific amount (5KB/sec), which means if there is a sudden spike in the amount of data required to be sent (such as 30 players from each side clashing at high speed or portalling in), then then server only sends as much entity information as will fit in that 5KB/sec, which in practise means delays in receiving player model/position updates.

I don’t know where you’re getting this number from, but in large fight I’m getting network utilization of 0.15-0.20+% on a 100Mbps link. That’s 0.15Mbps or 150Kb/sec. This is a far larger number than the 40Kb/sec you are claiming is the maximum.

The actual number doesn’t really matter, the point is, it’s capped, and culling occurs when entity property update payload exceeds capped bandwidth.

I assure you the number is not 150KB/sec however. That would be > the bandwidth of a T5 line with 5K clients connected… Typical numbers for MMOs are in the lowish single-double digits KB/sec (ie: 5-50KB/sec). FYI you need to look at process-specific bandwidth, not system bandwidth, specifically UDP traffic.

its definitely worse for me as well, i cant even see my commander anymore.
Maybe have the placeholder with the old culling technique.

mjharrison.3209:

Visiroth.5914:

mjharrison.3209:

crouze.3078:

Culling = server calculating what you will see and then send you the data.
pro: you can play with a worse internet connection / GPU.
con: calculating needs time and you have to wait longer for the data.

No. Culling = client – server comms are capped to a specific amount (5KB/sec), which means if there is a sudden spike in the amount of data required to be sent (such as 30 players from each side clashing at high speed or portalling in), then then server only sends as much entity information as will fit in that 5KB/sec, which in practise means delays in receiving player model/position updates.

I don’t know where you’re getting this number from, but in large fight I’m getting network utilization of 0.15-0.20+% on a 100Mbps link. That’s 0.15Mbps or 150Kb/sec. This is a far larger number than the 40Kb/sec you are claiming is the maximum.

The actual number doesn’t really matter, the point is, it’s capped, and culling occurs when entity property update payload exceeds capped bandwidth.

I assure you the number is not 150KB/sec however. That would be > the bandwidth of a T5 line with 5K clients connected… Typical numbers for MMOs are in the lowish single-double digits KB/sec (ie: 5-50KB/sec). FYI you need to look at process-specific bandwidth, not system bandwidth, specifically UDP traffic.

I said 150Kb, not 150KB. which is why I converted your 5KB/s into 40Kb/s as comparison. FYI my system network utilization before launching GW2 was 0%.

Looking at the individual process bandwidth yielded similar results. The bandwidth peaked even higher at a tower fight. It also showed that my ping to their datacenter is absolutely horrible @ 250ms. How is this possible for a US server…

Just ran 2 of us into the dredge mobs moving towards speldan.. and they literally only appeared IN melee range…

… culling in 2v5 PvE situation !? o.O

Kelo.4370:

As someone with a really good computer, culling is next to non-existent for me in most situations and when I do have some it is when there are over 100+ players all in the same small area. The culling change is great and I hope ANet doesn’t revert it again. If you are having more problems now then before it is cause your computer is trash, the new system requires more resources on the player’s end which is fine cause my computer was not getting stressed by GW2 to begin with. It is about time ANet stopping programming for the lowest common denominator.

Intel i5-3570k
ATI Radeon HD7950 3GB
16GB RAM
Game installed at the SSD
40 Mbitsec bandwidth
Is my comp trash?

And I think you are lie to us. Show us scrrenshot with the “100 ppls at the any distance”

Neandramathal.9536:

… culling in 2v5 PvE situation !? o.O

Yup – this is Arena…

Kelo.4370:

As someone with a really good computer, culling is next to non-existent for me in most situations and when I do have some it is when there are over 100+ players all in the same small area. The culling change is great and I hope ANet doesn’t revert it again. If you are having more problems now then before it is cause your computer is trash, the new system requires more resources on the player’s end which is fine cause my computer was not getting stressed by GW2 to begin with. It is about time ANet stopping programming for the lowest common denominator.

Well, I’m still experiencing culling after the update, eventhough my rig is also very good, which is very disheartning. The RAM cache in my system ensures the SSD does not pose a bottleneck. However, enemies are still being rendered way too late on my screen.

Intel i7-3770k @ 5.2GHz
MSI GTX 680 Lightning
16GB RAM @ 2400MHz
Game installed on SSD, with Fancy Cache (8200MB/s read, 1470MB/s write)
50 Mbit Internet

Kelo is a troll. Countless amount of players have issues with culling despite using very powerful PC’s.

My experience since the patch in wvw is a noticeable decrease in enemy culling and increase in friendly culling. I am happy with the changes and look forward to further enhancements.

I dont post much but this has fairly well ruined all my grouping experiances in both PvE and PvP. I dont PvP a whole lot but I cant manage it any way when I cant see the people obliterating me. There, on average, isnt even that much going on and npcs are invisible until they are dead in cursed shores groups (3-5 am central time) of maybe 6 to 10 people. My computer stats are pretty good so I dont understand why this “culling” even exsists and why this is the first game ive ever had any problems like this.

Never happened to me in GW1. Doesnt happen to me in games like DCUO and a lot of the time theres 200 or more randomly outfitted and colored characters on my screen all moving doing various animations and my computer doesnt have a bit of problem. I mean seriously why isnt there an option in the graphic settings to let me decide how many models I want to beable to load at a time like in almost every other pc game?

What’s funny about the new culling is rushing in to help defend the Lord’s Room of SM and think you’re all by yourself yet you’re not being attacked and all the red names around you are dying. I AM A GOD!

Then your team mates finally render. Sigh. Such a downer.

Honestly, though, it’s better, but nowhere near perfect. I still run into some culling on enemies, especially any that stealth. They still take longer to appear than they should.

The major issue I have with the “fix” doesn’t pertain to WvW. Sure, not seeing friendly players, or waiting long periods for NPC’s to load with other players around is annoying, but the PVE mobs not loading is pretty bad.

I’m guessing the system reporting treats friendly players, NPC’s and PvE mobs as the same type of “target”, and enemy players in WvW as the other. The dragons are a lagfest all the time, but now even in the middle of nowhere with maybe 1 or 2 players around, you can walk right up to mobs before they are reported to you. Not talking about their respawn, but them rendering in the same way zerg’s have been since launch.

For WvW, I haven’t had a chance to test it out this week, as apparently, we have a que each night.

So I upgrade recently and was able to experience both forms of culling on two different systems.

My old system had an E8500 wolfdale dual core OC’d to just above 4ghz and a Radeon 4850. I was lucky to see 40fps even in heart of the mist at lowest settings and would drop down to single digits in big fights in WvW.

My current system has an I7-3770k currently clocked at 4.2 stable with plenty of room to grow and a 7970. Using the same settings for reference, I get over 200fps in Heart, over 120 in WvW running around, and the drops to the 60’s in huge fights. (also have game and OS installed on SSD now)

Original Culling:

Sometimes enemies and mobs would not appear until you were standing in the middle of them when there were a lot of friendlies in the area. I could pretty much always see people on my side. In big fights the old system was hitching for me due to the low fps of the old system but it was smooth as silk on the new hardware. The thing was, on both systems, it seemed like I would actually see all/most of the enemies at some point without losing friendlies.

New/Trial Culling:

No need to split this really between the new and old system, because the results are the same.

When there are a lot of friendly players in the area, they fade in and out of view. One second they are there, and the next they vanish. More enemy players seem render from distance, but the more enemies there are, the less I am able to see my teammates and coordinate with them. Not only that, when there are a ton of friendlies and enemies in the area… not only do friendlies disappear into thin air, but enemies do as well. This includes enemies I am actively doing damage too. Both the new and old system in large fights is a little ‘off’ it seems like it is hitchy or stuttering. I can’t attribute it to FPS or CPU bottlenecks on my end as I have monitored and logged them during large fights. I can’t even attribute it to network activity on my end either as I am nowhere close to pegging my bandwidth in these situations.

To make it even worse, in PvE, I can no longer see mobs half the time if there are several friendlies in the area, even when standing in the middle of them and taking damage. No marker and no name tag, -and- friendly players appear and disappear.

Lastly there are a few odd things that happen once in a while. For example, I can be running around with 4-5 other people, no enemies in view, and very few mobs and still have players on my side fade in and out of thin air. I have also been out soloing and seen 2 people capping a point, figured I would disrupt them, use a gap closer to get to them quickly, and attack… only to find myself standing in the middle of a 50 man zerg. Then there is the random model that runs around with no name tag and you cant quickly tell if they are enemy or friendly…. doesnt matter if 2 other people are on screen or 40.

The current culling is better in some aspects, but overall, it is a far worse game play experience than the old system in PvE, zerg fights, and small manning in WvW. Something just isn’t right about it.

I have a powerful PC and culling is performing better for me after the update. Thieves aren’t perma-invis anymore and I can see more enemies on screen than before. The 2 enemies turning into 30 happened before this update as well, it hasn’t changed that in my experience. Allies disappearing is sort of weird but I’d rather see the enemy.

i5-3570k, OC’d to 4.6 GHz
GW2 is on my SSD, takes less than 10s to load any zone
GTX 660 Ti
8GB RAM

I can’t see allies that are 10 feet in front of me but nearly every enemy is rendering immediately for me now. I think it’s a fair trade off.

crouze.3078:

Culling = server calculating what you will see and then send you the data.
pro: you can play with a worse internet connection / GPU.
con: calculating needs time and you have to wait longer for the data.

It is not to help the clients, but the servers. Clients have more then enough (download) bandwith to handle the data and usually enough GPU power to render (basic) models near instantly.